I think selling at a loss is a very bad move. Nintendo didn't need to do such a drastic cut. Pricing it at even would have been smart. Say around the 199.99$ mark. A 50$ cut should have been more then sufficient, now if this succeeds Nintendo will price WiiU at a loss too, they won't make as much off hardware and rely increasingly on software. But what happens if software sales aren't as high as hoped? Nintendo will take a massive blow. Selling hardware at a loss could they ever return to the profitability of the Wii/DS generation?
I think Nintendo should never sell hardware at a loss. While its great for me the consumer it is not a wise buisness decision. Look at Sony and the amount of damage they took selling PS3 at a loss. Or Microsoft with the origional X-Box or even the 360 which only became profitable like two to three years into its life cycle.
Nintendo isn't like Sony or MS , they don't have tons of subsidiares to make them money. They can't rely on music and movie sales to keep them afloat. If hardware isn't turning a profit and then software bottoms out, its game over for Nintendo. So this is like stepping one foot into the fire and hoping the fire doesn't spread to the other foot and engulf the body.
Nintendo is playing with fire, lets pray they don't get burnt!
-JC7
"In God We Trust - In Games We Play " - Joel Reimer
